Monday 26th October: Spend the morning drafting a reply to an EA inquiry about Tweed data for a review they are doing of the Northumberland nets. We've got data from the 1850's to the 1990's of Sea-trout tagged in the Tweed being caught along the English coast. Out to do the traps afterwards - I'm on duty this week.   Half a dozen small males and immatures in the Kirkburn trap, nothing at Peebles (they need a decent spate to get up the burn there, which is very shallow for longish stretches) and four nice Brown-trout at Tweedsmuir, the biggest being a 585mm male. Two males and two females, obviously two pairs. It's quite common to catch pairs in traps, they team up before running a burn.  The Ettrick counter's over 2500 now for the month, which is getting reasonable. Over a hundred fish up the Gala today, mostly trout moving at night as its still quite low.

Tuesday 27th October: Started the day by going to the Philiphaugh Cauld to check on the counter display and the fish. Saw 20 go up on the  display in about 10 minutes and the cauld with lots of activity. Very warm, so no temperature difficulties as yet. When the water is colder, there's little jumping early in the day and it gradually builds up as the temperature rises to a late afternoon peak,  then stops at sunset. Spent the rest of the day at the traps, processing fish, taking samples from them and making improvements. More nice Brown-trout at Tweedsmuir, including a male of 63.5 cms, with the most developed kype I've ever seen on a trout, a massive snout, the upper jaw slightly pinched in and then bulging out, just like a real kipper Salmon. Just small immatures at the Kirkburn. Why immature trout run up at this time of year, I do not know, but some of the traps get large numbers of them. It could, I supose be that the burns are an easier habitat than the main river for them at high flows, but given the size of spates that can come down the burns, this seems unlikely. The first adult trout in the Peebles trap, 232mm. Back at the office, check the Philiphaugh count - its been just over 750 for the day, which must be one of the highest, if not the highest, daily total, we've ever had.

Wednesday 28th October:  Out with Kenny to do the traps. Spent most of the day at the Tweedsmuir trap making it more efficient for high water and easier to use. Another five nice Brown-trout in the trap there. Just small immatures / mature males in the other traps. A bit of drama while at the Peebles trap - an old lady collapsed while out walking nearby and, on the advice of her friends, Kenny drove her to the local hospital. Around 600 through the Ettrick counter today.

Thursday 29th October: Goosander & Cormorant count in the morning. Not much on my section, the river having come up a bit overnight and being a bit coloured, which could have put them off. In the afternoon, fishing as a guest of the Chairman at Coldstream. Saw plenty of fish moving, but only had two "runs", neither of which made serious contact. A very obvious group of very stale Sea-trout splashing around the mouth of the Leet, and almost certainly waiting to go up it. Although the Leet is the most damaged of the primary tributaries of the Tweed having been extensively canalised and with water quality issues as well, the Lambden Burn, one of its upper branches is in reasonable condition and has decent numbers of trout fry in it, so no great surprise that there should be a run of Sea-trout even in it. Only about 400 through the Ettrick counter today, so it seems as if the run there is tailing off. Kenny covering for me at the traps and got another five good trout at Tweedsmuir.

Friday 30th October:  Weekly staff meeting in the morning, then out to the traps. Only one at Tweedsmuir, where the water level has now fallen considerably, but it was a big, fat, female.  Looks like a new record count for October on the Ettrick, though this will only become apparent after checking as, to make up for a software glitch, there was a period when the counter was set  so that it would  register  "rejected" as "up" events as well, so the 10 secs of video would be recorded for them  for visual checking. There's around 600 of these which are probably all false that need to be deducted from the headline total but as this is now nearly 4700, this would still leave the overall count at around 4100, which is a bit more than we've had for any previous October. A lot of these will be Sea-trout, but from the visual checks I've done, the majority are Salmon. What's also good is that the counts have been tailing off, even though conditions for running have remained excellent, showing that all who want to get up the  Ettrick are getting up and that there's none will be left behind.